"Mew?" "Mew meow." "Mew Mew?" Meow mew meow meow." "Yowl."
It almost sounded like those cats were talking.
If he were the type to be paranoid, he might even go so far as to think they were talking about HIM.
Gendo got up from his hard Italian chair, opened the window, and prepared to throw a shoe at the noisemakers. He stopped and stared, then slowly closed the window.
The sea of green and golden eyes reflected in the streetlamps watched the window briefly, occasionally blinking.
Things were going on elsewhere in the Geofront.
Makoto got home, and didn't check behind the closing door or he would have noticed Rei-ojou locking it behind him.
Godai Hayashi of his school's Reading Club was getting up with tousled hair and a nearly manic grin, holding hands with the track star Maki Tsudaka as the two decided whether to go to his home or hers.
Two converted police officers, Keiko Chiba and Yuki Akamatsu, were showing some of the other officers in their locker room that indeed those parts were quite real.
Technical Division #2 had been missing two girls who'd ended up going all the way down to Terminal Dogma to fix some wiring. They'd returned and punched out for the evening saying that they'd found something but would have to wait until tomorrow to fix it due to ordering some special parts from Egypt. It was odd how one of them had repeatedly rolled her "Rs" - almost like she was purring or something.
Alicia Handa, Yukari Shinoi, Hae-Jung Paek, and Rei Mizuhara had shared the gift with several classmates before deciding they'd done their part and concentrating on chosen mates. Now that evening had arrived, catgirls led their chosen from the school with the explanation that the club meetings had "run a little over.".
Evening in Tokyo-3. Night in Washington DC..
It got eerie in the Smithsonian after the doors had closed for the final part of the evening. Many of the paintings and statues and displays seemed to watch things with oddly disapproving eyes. Almost as if to say "I lived, I struggled, I worked - and look what you've done with your inheritance."
They weren't, of course. Just one of the tales told by the older folk to the newer.
There never had been, for instance, a case of some Thing coming out of the Vault in Sub-Basement 4A and devouring unwary interns or undergraduates from the rattling air vents.
There never had been, for another example, a case of ceremonial garb from Bubastis erupting in colored light and throwing off the detritus of the intervening ages to sit in renewed splendor. Until now at least.
One of the workers there, Melody Smithe had been born in 1959. In 2015 that made her 56. She might not have been ancient but she was hardly young and a youth spent sunning herself and engaging in a somewhat decadent lifestyle had put more than a few lines in her face after youth's concealing nature had fled. A motorcycle accident that had broken a hip had just slowed her down a little. Second Impact had altered that, thrown out the late night parties and 'if it feels good do it' attitude. Suddenly she had been faced with not only narcotic withdrawal from the cut supplylines - she had to survive in a world she was ill suited for.
Somehow she had survived where many of her friends and colleagues from before had not. Some had died in Second Impact. Some had died in the Food Riots. Some had passed on from the lack of medical care in the weeks following Second Impact.
Now, here she was, a curator at the Smithsonian. Neither young nor pretty enough, at least any more, to play tour guide - she was instead a paperwork shuffler and an "old hand" here. She's spread her own share of ghost stories around the place.
She also knew that some of the stories had at least a kernal of truth to them. Ghosts moving things about? Well, maybe. Sometimes things did seem to have moved from when you'd last looked at them no matter that a few seconds had passed. Odd lights, feelings of presence, odd scents sometimes? True. There was a section of wall that had been replaced twice because it always developed an odd chill and faint dampness. Oh, to be sure, there were rational explanations for all of them - it was just that the rational explanations always seemed to fall short.
So when Melody Smithe saw the shadows of a display hall shift when she was supposed to be the only one there, she was only moderately alarmed. When odd glows appeared in the Egyptian exhibit, she was curious enough to investigate.
"Foo, who let you in here, kitty?" Melody looked disapprovingly at the old cat strutting purposefully from the room. "Who let..."
Cats regarded her from atop most of the exhibits, warily watching from nooks and crannies.
"Damn kids," was the first conclusion Melody made.
A rumbling cough brought her attention to the center of all those cats.
Sitting atop a table was a golden lioness that seemed to regard her with impatience.
Melody Smithe, survivor of Third Impact who was only 56 though she looked 10 years older than that, promptly fainted.
One of the lead cats sighed. "Well, that certainly didn't go well."
Melchior linked to Balthazar. Balthazar linked to Caspar. Caspar linked to Melchior.
The three Magi at NERV linked to Lillith's "game boy" and then to the network of computers outside. Reibits added her input and worked the interface.
And over a little statuette, unnoticed by anyone, a sign popped into being.
Allison Burke had not lived through Second Impact. She had been born in Liverpool in 2001 and was now a young computer fangirl. Though she was just getting started on this new game "the World" - she'd heard enough to be quite interested.
Nearly instantaneous translation of languages? A communal MMORG which had people who viewed dungeon slashing as being beneath them or uninteresting but found that whatever activity they wanted to engage in - there was a section off for them?
You could never be sure whether the shopkeep you bargained with was a computer NPC or real PC of someone who just wanted to play that sort of character.
Allison quickly set her account up. It was free for a week while they debugged, promises of a paid service thereafter were interesting but she'd have to see about that. In the meantime she didn't have to pay the Character Generation Fee, Character Storage Fee, or any of that sort of thing. If she wanted to take the full service when it was up and running, she could then use her experienced character and still not pay the Generation Fee.
First thing that came up was Change gender? That was a bit odd, but Allison quickly figured out it was going from the account setup. Most people played the same gender they were in real life. Not all though. Allison chose to remain female in this game. At least to begin with.
Choose Race
Allison wondered when it would ask for a name. Usually that was the first thing. Let's see. No humans?
Mithrras
Half-Mithrras
Elf (Coming Soon)
Dwarf (Coming Soon)
Canis (Coming Soon)
Ogrii (Coming Soon)
Dark Elf (Coming Soon)
Human (Coming Soon)
Clicking an inquiry, Allison discovered that the Mithrras were a catfolk described as "alurrring, proud and distant, or cuddly and cute - depending on their mood." That sounded interesting but she chose half-Mithrras as that seemed the most human choice.
Choose Class
Twin Blade
Magician
Acrobat
Engineer
Heavy Blade
Sage
Cleric
Thief
Entertainer
Dancer
Other?
While curious, Allison decided to go back later and try something complicated. Right now she'd just go with her first inclination. Acrobat
Allison gasped at the image that appeared. It was HER. Well, except her onscreen character was taller and leaner and her real self didn't have that muscle tone - nor the ears and tail. Definitely a circus-acrobat sort of physique. A staff in one hand, a sly look on that face, and the tail was animated to sway gently back and forth behind her.
Allison rotated the picture. The outfit was a fairly simple one, tunic, belt with a pouch over each hip, dagger on the belt, what looked like breeches ending in a kneepad, with supple looking boots.
Do you want to be this character? Y/N/O
Suppressing a laugh at the poorly translated question, Allison clicked Yes. There was a flash of white light, her VR gear felt odd somehow, and there was a brief dizzy spell.
Not noticing her current resemblence to her online character, Allison continued to play the game, her tail flexing gently behind her.
Read the comments on this episode
(Posted Sat, 27 Sep 2003 14:07)
Questions? Problems? Suggestions?
Send a mail to addventure@bast-enterprises.de
or use the contact form.
らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
All other series and their characters are © by their respective creators or owners. No claims of ownership of these characters are implied by the authors of this Addventure, or should be inferred.
The Anime Addventure is a non-profit site.